Husbandry and housekeeping (excerpt of "Slow Dread", book 2 of the Hunter series)
Uhland had once suggested I should learn more wife skills. My stance on that was clear: "I don't need a husband."
Uhland had once suggested I should learn more wife skills. You know, to be able to find a good husband later. Like: „Whatever shall become of that wild child? No one in their right mind would want a wife like that.“ That kind of talk.
„You should really teach her more about the skills a wife needs.“ were the exact words he said. I remember that one well, because it sparked some perverse amusement in me.
„You’ll never find a husband for her, that way.“ was the follow-up, I think. And this after I‘d come to accept he was really a nice guy at heart, despite all appearances to the contrary. Guess he was still enough of a jerk.
My mentor just told him: „Take care of your own matters, Uhland“, very matter-of-factly.
He was well within his rights, too. I was his apprentice, not Uhland’s, and no one got a say in a master‘s matters, least of all personal ones.
Least of all Sintram’s.
And I was very happy about that. Because, if you asked me, once he‘d opened up and wasn’t such a grump to be around anymore, he was the best I could‘ve possibly asked for. We always shared chores. And I mostly got to do the ones I liked or at least didn’t mind, not the ones I hated. Sintram was used to leading a bachelor‘s life after all—he‘d had to do everything on his own before I’d come around and convinced him to take me on. Guess he was just happy to have someone to share with at all.
Strange how Uhland could talk that way, seeing how he, too, was an eternal bachelor. But I guess… maybe he just had so many friends and affairs, he ended up being quite at ease with a luxurious living relying on others to do the work. Or maybe he‘d just grown up somewhere where that was normal, though I couldn’t imagine where that was supposed to be.
This time, apparently, he‘d succeeded in getting both of us annoyed, though.
I shouldn’t have taken it as license to gripe the way I did. But I guess I thought it safe, and maybe I also remembered Sintram‘s first betrayal of me a little too well—or rather, what it‘d felt like at the time; until afterwards, when I finally understood the matter better.
So maybe it was that which prompted my snarkiness this day.
„He can’t leave well enough alone, can he? Do you think he‘ll ever drop that matter of his opinion about me being a girl and what females should do or not do if he had a say?“ I inquired of my teacher that night as we‘d settled down in our hut—him doing the dishes, like always, me occupying myself prepping some new arrows and giving the whittling tool a new edge. He was the older friend to the man, after all. I wasn’t quite sure if I‘d even call Uhland my friend yet, what with his recurring needling, despite how much I liked his stories. The man was damn well near unbearable to me sometimes.
„Can‘t change an old bear.“ he replied, shrugging, not even looking up from the sink.
„We did hear the same, right? How can you stand that?“ I insisted.
He lifted one lazy eyebrow at me. I don’t.
Yeah, yeah, I know. I waved at him, unconvinced.
„You didn’t sound very … insistent, is what I mean.“ It was true.
She can take better care of herself than you ever could. So go educate yourself before you go on accusing other people.
His words might‘ve been taken as biting. But his tone had been much too mild for his usual manner of how he talked when he meant his putdowns to sting. More like someone who‘s had this topic come up way too many times already and is just replying by reflex. Which nettled me. How many times had Uhland said such things to him when I wasn’t around to hear it?
„Well, as long as you‘re not changing our arrangement.“ I glanced at Papá at last, since no reply seemed forthcoming; a wry smirk starting to bloom on my lips. „Because I for one am quite happy with it.“
I should‘ve stopped there. I couldn’t.
„I don’t need a husband.“ I said, leaning back on the rough trunks of the hut‘s walls, basically sprawling on our big cot. His cot, officially.
I noticed how Papá turned around by a tiny increment, of course. Curious maybe. Possibly concerned. Or maybe he had already picked up on the tone lurking behind my voice now. But I didn’t heed it.
„You‘re doing well enough as houseband, methinks,“ I jibed and smirked at the notion as well as my newly created mock-word, using my best Uhland voice. „Should be quite enough if one of us knows how to wive, eh?“
Because I‘d caught the implication my papá apparently hadn’t—or pretended not to notice at the very least: That he knew wife skills well enough to teach them, had he cared to. I couldn’t quite believe either of the men hadn’t picked up on that one.
How else was Sintram to teach me? Send me to one of the village women? As if they‘d know what to do with me. Or not be vexed about the intrusion.
I didn’t get further than that in my thinking, because by then he‘d reached the cot and proceeded to douse my insolence by the coldness of the washing water still clinging to his skin and the general unfairness of the sudden tickle attack that made me unable to stop giggling as if I truly were some small slip of a child still, shrieking at nothing and quite unable to defend itself. Even if I upturned the whole hut in my mad dash out of reach, spraying whatever was still on the table into every direction by unthinkingly—or maybe rather: not caring—just jumping across it; poor feet first, who‘d gotten it worst, sliding across to get to the chair to use as shield in my impromptu defense.
Also, quite deliberately flinging at him whatever I got into my hands to fend him off. Because that one didn’t play fair, and he didn’t care either.